In most scenarios, a performance plagued by flooded hallways and a malfunctioning encore would be labeled a disaster. But with Ava Max running the show, somehow fans left the Paradise Rock Club last night (June 6) wearing smiles that sparkled like diamonds, even as their shoes squished into a carpet soaked with mystery fluid.
The positive reaction might just be the crown jewel of Max’s current tour in support of her 2023 album Diamonds & Dancefloors — and provide all the proof needed to dispel the widely-circulated belief that Max is a flash in the pan.
Every pop stan has seen, sent, or spread the tweets: The ones that categorize Max as a snore, a fad, a bargain bin Lady Gaga (who’s paradoxically also labeled a fad). Merely a woman who wrote one sticky-as-hairspray hook for the 2018 mega-smash “Sweet But Psycho” and has coasted ever since.
Under a cynical lens, the accusations seemed to add up. Max had gradually perfected a trendy but harmless edge, like a diluted shot of arsenic that resembled Gaga’s macabre The Fame Monster but posed no threat of murdering her widespread appeal. She sported an asymmetrical haircut and earned nearly 1.5 billion Spotify streams singing “muh-muh-muh-muh-muh-mine” — not unlike Gaga’s stuttering m’s on “Poker Face” and “Monster” — but left lyrics about grisly activities like devouring hearts to Mother Monster. (On a woefully ironic note, Gaga’s Ariana-Grande-assisted single “Rain on Me” played on the house speakers almost directly before Max’s opening number).
And even though Max still embraces her noirish leanings on tour, stalking across the stage in black platform Demonia (probably) boots, Tuesday night’s show made it clear that there were no cheap copies present at the ‘Dise. In fact, Max all but spelled it out.
“Ava Max can’t sing.” “Ava Max will never last.” “She’s a one-hit wonder.” One mid-show interlude of prerecorded accusations summarized years of harassment. Then Max’s voice cut through the noise with a deity-like calm: “No matter what anyone says about you, no matter what anyone thinks about you, it does not make you who you are. Only you define you.” New song “Weapons” came after the pointed PSA, but it was following number “Maybe You’re The Problem” that brought down the bejeweled hammer mic stand.
Max’s lively 2022 single is more than an ecstatic kiss-off to an egocentric ex. It’s also a toast to parting ways with toxicity in all its forms, best served live, so Max’s raving fanbase can demonstrate her knack for infectious choruses with every gleeful chant of “Your point of view / Got it all backwards / You should take your little finger and just point it in the mirror / Maybe you’re the problem.” It’s whimsical to embrace the role of the song’s antagonist — some fans waved homemade signs boasting “I’m the Problem” and “Hell yeah, we’re the problem!” — but above all, “Maybe You’re The Problem” deflects nitpicking comparisons while asserting control over Max’s narrative.
Wielding the song’s armor, Max flexed her finest pop star swagger, throwing her hips in perfect circles for “Sleepwalker” and bellowing a throaty warble on “Belladonna.” She taunted her way through flippant renditions of “Who’s Laughing Now” and “Not Your Barbie Girl,” providing an hour of levity that helped fans overlook the freak dilemmas bookending the show. The Paradise’s entryway and first-floor bathroom were waterlogged before Max even sauntered onstage. Later, when performing her grand exit — “Motto,” a thumping collaboration with Tiësto — the audio cut out and was never restored, forcing fans to repeat the chorus as Max and her crew danced through the final number without a proper on-mic goodbye.
Sometime before the encore’s folly, but after flooding hit the hallways, Max lounged on a chaise, her steely eyes fixed on an indistinguishable point in the distance. Her unforgiving stare never faltered as she waited for her cue to utter “I keep a pistol under my pillow at night,” the opening lines of “Cold As Ice.” Yet fans could barely see her, if at all, in the fleeting shadows between between songs.
Even when no one was watching, Ava Max was committed to the bit. It’s the exact level of theatrics no knockoff could ever imitate.